Love. This is where I want to start. Just saying that word makes a shift. Love, love, love. It opens doors. It can move mountains. It can change our hearts.

I don’t know about you, but I have been heartbroken over the past year. Each new division, violent act, revelation, and disconnected directive from our government has felt like a hopeless shifting sand with no bottom in sight. I send a huge hug to every one of us holding this collective Tower Card. The emotions of seeing things come apart, and the unsettledness of not knowing how it will shake out is hard to take. This is a time when we are being called from our souls to have courage, pluck, and strength in every waking moment. And for many of us, in our dream states as well. The touching thing is, we are doing it. Yay for us!

The strength we need comes from the heart. It comes from the connection to our Ancestors and our loved ones in spirit. It comes from our creativity and intuition. The light of the Ancestors is shining down on us, lets absorb it to be renewed. Listen for it’s call to dig deep for the courage to follow it’s lead.

I have a lot of faith in this moment. Crazy right? Yet, I do have faith. Faith is a gift, a blessing. It is restored in me when I see people rising above, standing for what is right, finding their ground in ethics and being willing to create a new story. I have faith when I am given the right words to follow my own heart in this precious moment of becoming whole. Renewed in the risks I take to love others.

The change around us does not need to define us. I see clients allowing spiritual guidance to help them enrich and heal their lives. People are riding on the waves of change to rise to the challenge of healing wounds and the tender stuck places we all have been to. There is energy in this moment. Especially before Mercury goes retrograde on Dec. 3 and we can dive into deeper thought and insight until Dec 23rd. I have a few offerings on my calendar page for those of you who want to jump into increasing your intuitive or healing skills. To give you strength and increased light inside while the Sun takes a break on it’s way to Solstice. I hope you join us!

Last moth I participated in the HLPF (High Level Political Forum) at the UN. The HLPF is a way for civil society, us regular people in NGO’s, to get involved with contributing to policy that gets taken up formally by the international community at the UN. (An NGO, or Non-Governmental Organization, is a non-profit engaged with work that furthers the mission of the UN). The Forum contributes to shaping international law. DESA did a good job of managing the Forum, helping us non-governmental actors to demystify the process. The 2 Major Groups that I am a part of, the NGO Major Group, and the Women’s Major Group did a wonderful job of giving everyone there a chance to contribute. It went really well, until the following week when the Ministers arrived, and the creaky wheels of governmental message monopolization met the pavement of our ideals and enthusiasm. It showed us just how hard the process of rising above the noise of politics-as-usual can be. Frustrating, demoralizing and difficult. And it was like an astringent. Bracing, but good for you. It is, after all, reality.

Nonetheless, you can be sure that the massive and well organized representation of the peoples interests at the HLPF will not go unnoticed. The Secretariat of the UN has changed their position on a more inclusive process, the Governments are beginning to see that wisdom, and this is just the beginning. The wheels are creaking in another direction now. The Sustainable Development Goals will not be achieved without it. Although it is going to take a lot of adjustment, governments are facing the fact that change is not going to come about unless they engage with us, and we work together. They just don’t have the resources to do otherwise.

Which brings me to my next thought…

A lot of us feel the weight of the world on us right now. As the world faces a presidency in the USA that has little bearing in the real world of solutions and is steeped in a litany of problems, it’s easy to lose faith. Our moral decency feels like it is being blown out of the water. The result of the constant onslaught of drama is that we feel ungrounded and overwhelmed. Which is just what we are being engineered to feel. Unless we have a very solid and strong spiritual practice to hold us, (and I do not mean new age mumbo jumbo here) we are going to feel like we are being punched in the face every time we digest and take in thing #1, thing #2 and thing #3. With each new gain in the outrageous, it just gets more out of control. If we can pull back and be in our spiritual selves for a time, we can gather the strength and the detachment from the drama to stay with our focus. Unhooking from drama does not excuse it, it allows us to move past outrage into calm decision making and discernment. Out of reaction into sensible and grounded solutions. Which is where we can connect to other POV to get things done.

There IS an intersection between politics, improving the world, and spirituality. Our job, as people of spirit, is to hold that meeting point. As the spiritual enters the political, it has its own way of opening things up. By bringing spirituality into things, they change of their own accord. Therefore, change is not overwhelming or forced. It flows like the wind on a beautiful day, as the leaves rustle, and we absorb it’s fullness. We don’t have to do much more than that, unless we want to bring it a step further. And then, as we find ways to insist on the spiritual, not by insisting that others be spiritual, but by insisting that the outcomes are aligned with ethical and moral ideas that are shaped by spirituality, then we see things change according to an evolution of human consciousness. No one owns that or even directs that. But we can board the ship, and stay the course.

This political time, which is so rife with tearing apart the ideals of democracy, needs push back. And a development of our own integrity. Democracy is an idea that is based in self governance. Which also applies to a self governance of our inner selves. If our emotional, psychological or spiritual parts are running riot, then we are not able to govern ourselves or elect trusted servants. We elect people who reflect the discordance. We must take that responsibility. Every one of us can participate in our democracy and must do this if it is to survive. The discordant elements have arisen to be addressed. This means getting involved…out there, in person. Go to a town meeting, visit your representatives and talk to them. Start putting your energies into this face to face, before we lose it. Although protest is good and has it’s place, I don’t think its only about the oppositional. The key is to fight back by shaping policies. Anyone can propose a policy or join in it’s creation. Get creative. Sit down with others and identify a problem. Research. Figure out policy to address the problem. Bring it to your reps. And stand by it. One thing at a time.

The process is slow, but just like our continental congress labored to bring our country into existence, worth every bit of effort. That applies to ourselves and to the world. Loving and accepting things as they are is the first step to addressing anything. Let’s jump into the flowing river of change together. The Earth, the trees, the wind and the soil have our back. Let’s stop trying to know and just be a part of un-knowing together. That is how we enter he sacred numinous land of creative possibility. Once we touch that, no matter how much we get slapped down, that wondrous voice fills us and keeps us strong.

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”

-Rumi

Aw, here we are again, celebrating the holiday of love. I enthusiastically support any excuse to be reminded of it!! To help you be steeped in the energy of love, I am offering a special VDay reading to Love Warriors who want to sharpen their love skills and understand any obstacles to increasing your love vibration. We will look at increasing connection in existing relationships, or how you can revel in love to attract a wonderful new love. This reading helps you work on your relationship skills, something we could all use help with! And a lot of times, uncovers issues that free you to enjoy your path to love.

Buy before Feb. 14th and schedule a time during the month of February.

2. After you purchase it, email me at revcathy@mindspring.com to schedule sometime this month. My hours are Tu, Wed, Fri 10am-3pm, and Th 7-9pm. Give me 3 time options and I will email you back. I am only doing 10 of these readings, so get yourself in the queue!

This is one of my favorite times of the year, the Snow moon, and with a fresh blanket of snow in my neck of the woods in Brooklyn. I think it’s the first real snow I have seen all winter here, and I really love the show mother earth put on today. We have an amazing portal to higher things opening on this Full Moon, and I am in awe of its generosity, opportunity and potential. Contradictions, upsets, openings, beginnings and the containment of opposites, so we can peel back the layer of mist that has caused so much confusion to us all. So many things going on. Let’s get to it!

Personally, Leo moon in the 12th house means it’s a time of finding out what makes you shine, what your values are, and the hidden gems that are lurking beneath the surface. Hidden motivations, what do you love about the things around you, creativity, enthusiasm, passion, generosity, kindness, leadership, benevolence, self-confidence, as well as setting right arrogance and self-centeredness, and hidden ego issues. Opposite the self-sacrificing Aquarius Sun in the 6th house of work, work, work. Gotta get things right.

First contradiction (global + personal): Warm gregarious, yet reluctant Leo Moon, melting the frozen cold emotions of the over worked Aquarius Sun casting a shadow over its hidden attributes. Let me take that one apart okay? A Snow moon is about being frozen, stopped in its tracks to be reflected upon, then released as a new beginning, typically as we warm up to spring. Ironically, its Leo’s natural warmth and playfulness that is stopped in action, along with its leadership capabilities. To boot, it is in the 12th house of hidden things, so it is even more restricted. The Sun on the other hand, is stuck in the overworked and over wrought tempest of perfection and selfless service to humanity, but lacks the emotion to carry it off, so it is a little sanctimonious. So how that plays out is that we are caught in confusion, not knowing how to manifest our own leadership capabilities, yet out there trying to get things moving, a little devoid of the intuitive capacities to know what to do next. The end result, is that we are caught trying to move ahead without complete guidance from the inside. Unless we slow down and sit with the feelings of frozenness, powerlessness and the fear that engenders, we will not be able to tap into the potential of the identification with all of humanity at this time. The split between nurturance and didactic strictness, is reflected in the polarities politically and personally. Unless we learn to bring nurturance to the didactic and discipline to the nurture, we will not find balance.

The good news is that the Sun/Moon opposition is held in two amazing configurations, a cardinal grand square, and a double trine that looks like the Star of David. It’s nature is tempered by Virgo rising, a relaxing of perfectionism and a call to something greater than ourselves, that we have to work for. The comet – Comet 45P (interesting name right?) runs right through both the Star of David configuration and it’s enclosed Grand Square, that seems like a portal. So, let me explain this all because it is really great!

I was surprised to find that this Full Moon is conjunct the U.S. presidents 12 house Mars and Leo Rising. So, where he is going and how he is presenting himself is pissing a lot of people off, and energizing others. And what some are doing is freezing him out and making him angry and acting from a hidden place of frustration. This polarity is what is being frozen in midair, so we can look at it, and the confusion that it causes can be peeled back for us to look at. If we can drop our anger for the opposite side, and reflect on what we need to know about each other, we will realize that our common ground lies somewhere in the middle. Leo rules the heart and Aquarius rules circulation, so a frozen heart cannot circulate among its people, like it is supposed to. It needs to relax its belief systems, allow nurturance in and let go of too much constriction. We are headed towards a way of talking about our differences. When we do, there will be unleashed a lot of creativity and innovation that can help us rise above this mess. We actually need each other to do so. It’s not us against them, it is all of us together.

The trines/Star of David configuration, involves the Moon, Jupiter, Saturn, Sun, Uranus, and the charts MC or zenith. When we stop and allow our hearts to thaw out so we can be in touch with our emotions, we see the expansive opportunities for grounded planning and the creation of opportunity, we examine the strict father energy that some are embracing and understand where it comes from, we then have more access to what are we willing to work for, what revolution are we ready for, and we are freed to move ahead into action. Whew! What a lot to hold to, and be in the middle of.

I look to the Cardinal grand square for the answer to this problem. Grand squares tear us apart in 4 directions. The only way to navigate them it to come to a neutral, holy space in the middle and ask the Universe for direction. Only in that way can we integrate these 4 powerful forces. So, the things that we are working with are:

A lot of people want better financial ground to stand on. They need to look to ways to create and take advantage of opportunities for themselves so that fear can be alleviated. The belief that outsourcing, or blaming others for the problem is diametrically opposed to its opposite…

Technology is here, and it has displaced a population that is more mechanically/hands on oriented. What I mean by this is that a lot of people are not tech savvy, nor are they inclined to be. There are a lot of people out there who are smart as a whip, but just not gonna be tech people. So, we need to create jobs for them that reflect a new economy. At the same time, breaking apart of larger interests (like corporations, large government structure, money held by just a few) results in the investment in smaller businesses that can accommodate these kinds of ideas, probably energy oriented and addressing our infrastructure.

Release fear. Consolidating our power at home, instead being vulnerable to fear and isolation will ground our financial problems. There is a lot of reaction and fear of being perceived as weak, so instead we have to puff up and make ourselves look REALLY strong. If we understood what real power is, then we would not need to do this. We would create policies that belie our inner strength. But with people feeling insecure financially, and not sure of what the future will bring with technology, and not sure about our leadership or our own person al power, we are stuck undermining our own authority. The shadow pervades. We are out of touch with the welcoming, kind hearted policies that made our country champions in the world. The opposite of that is…

Showing our nurturing, kind and openhearted values to the world, allows us to lead powerfully with a humanitarian view. Our home is everywhere. Human beings are human beings, no matter where they come from. We have a lot to repair in our world view, but knowing that the world is our home is the place to begin.

We are called to sit in the middle of these opposite views and see the common threads they carry and reflect in each other. This takes patience, removing judgement, finding commonality, yet keeping our ability to know what just isn’t right and rejecting that. So we all could do with some of this sitting still and cogitating in the middle. Turn on your feeling, sensing selves and let the middle ground come to you. the place where we can find love, compassion and forgiveness. One heart, One mind. There is an answer.

Now I will look to the Comet – Comet 45P/ Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova. I am giving this comet a strong feminine attribute, as it appears green, it is actually coming from the orbit of Venus, and I feel portends great feminine power rising. Because it’s last pass around the Sun was so close, it lost its tail, in a way emasculating it, and making it more like a star. Making it more feminine. It’s really frozen ice, which brings us back to our theme of Frozen Moon energy, the frozen feminine that shines from within its icy palace. This is what we follow through the portal, this is what we seek to unwind, this is what we need to find and thaw within each of us to master in this time. Our shining green hearts. In the very real sense… Mother Earth. Our real connection to resolving all our issues comes from her energies. As far as I can track it, 45P moves through this chart from Venus which is in the 7th house, down and out through the 3rd house in Scorpio. So I feel it is activating everything near its eclipse…Venus (femine power and the denial of it), Neptune (spiritual outlook and delusion), Sun (ego and power), Mercury (innovation and communication), Pluto (power issues), Saturn (structure to build and to tear down), and on its way out, it just cruises right by Lilith. Illuminating the darkness we want to push away about the feminine. Wow. Just wow.

The tricky part is, can we hold it? Do we want to play? Are we really ready to hold common humanity with all the people we have unfriended on Facebook? Detractors will comment, NO! RESIST! Well, I agree, I want to resist myself. But I also want to caution that we might be just falling into the same trap by only doing that. Our resistance needs to include openness to the people who are on the other side. Once we take the ice out of our own hearts and let Mother Earth hold the darkness we are a fearing, there might be room to figure this thing out. Our hearts might be kinder. It is going to be messy and people will get thrown down. Just remember to include humanity in the mix. Give them a hand up. Remember they are in pain. Just like we are. Revolution means tearing down the structures that are in the way of the good, but at the same time having love in our hearts for the people. That is the real way, the way of love. Onward!

We were all born with intuitive gifts, but over the years, as our logical brains developed, most of us turned off this crucial “in the gut” connection. Our feeling, sensing selves sublimated to our more rational thinking, proof oriented nerd selves. Which isn’t bad, we need those skills to be in the world around us and succeed. But just as vital for business, relationships and decision making, is the gut feeling, the thoughtless knowing, that we feel in our bodies, or just know somehow. And that part of us is usually right.

Intuitives, psychics and creative people live in this realm and have learned to trust it’s wisdom. Far from woo-woo or wishful thinking, they have learned to integrate intuition at a level of processing that navigates the most crucial and important next steps to developing anything. They have gotten past the doubt, the indecision and double thinking by just trusting the first thing that comes to them to do and doing it. It’s about taking action, and seeing what happens. Embracing the adventure of letting that knowingness take hold. With each success, right brained people learn to traverse the bridge between rational thought and inner guidance, and follow it’s threads. Its deliciousness and wonder makes life feel better and more satisfying.

When personal desire for an outcome, or too much thinking clouds your vision, then turning to professionals in this realm is what smart people do, to come back into trust with their gut. Intuitive readings should resonate with what you already know and direct you towards trusting yourself to take actions on your own behalf. Sometimes, a good intuitive might tell you something you might not want to hear, or something you have a hard time grasping because you expected a different answer. If you give your mind time to create another pathway, you see that the intuitive was opening a door for you to greater awareness. A lot of times we are stuck because we have shut down our feeling intuitive selves, and created a scenario that leaves no room for us to imagine a solution. Our desire for a certain outcome is too powerful. This messes with our ability to trust our intuitive selves. Because really, life is a crap shoot. Intuition increases the odds. That part of the brain is way ahead of the reasoning process.

Here are 4 ways to get into the flow. They help you increase awareness of things you might be taking for granted, and are a basic, but important part of this realm.

Awareness. Start noticing your feelings about situations before you enter them. How do you feel about getting into that subway car? How do you feel about walking into that party? How do you feel about the meeting you are about to have? Take mental note of your feelings and then see what happens for real. Were you right? Did doing that open anything up for you?

Meditate. Yes, simple meditation is key for allowing oneself to be in the flow. Meditation trains the mind to tolerate empty spaces, setting thought aside. It’s like creating a blank page. Your life is the painting. Tolerating that empty space invites flow into your life. Where there is a vaccum…the divine flows in.

Allow. Stop trying to figure things out. That’s right, put that problem on the back burner. Instead play with imaginative writing. Ask a question and write down the first thing that comes into your mind. And then allow a second thing to come on in. And then you are writing and finding something emerging, bringing you closer to an answer.

Heart. Emotions are powerful tools. Your heart is connected to intuition through empathy. It is a feeling state that carries much information. What are your emotions telling you about a situation? Why do you have that feeling when you hang out with a certain group of people? Or even before you begin to pick up the phone?

And… if none of these help you get clear, get yourself to an intuitive. It’s what we do best! You will be glad you opened up your story.

In order to remain responsive to the change all around us, and to support our friends and families, here are a few suggestions to rally our strength for the coming months.

1. Get lots of sleep. So here’s the truth, our worry changes nothing. It only harms us. It might sound overly simple, but at this time we need to keep sharp and even tempered. Better done with good sleep.

2. Create an place where you can deposit your worry. Whether its a God Box, or a spot out in Nature, a tree or river, create a place to leave your worries daily. You do not have to go there every day. Just ask that spot if it will take your worries and help you be more relaxed during this time.

3. Meditation. There is nothing better for times of stress than meditation. Any form of brain time-out will do. Sitting down at the mat, or a run or walk outside, even an exercise routine will calm the body and mind. And I mean time with out stimulus, no radio, no internet, maybe some relaxing music and just you. The time off from thinking does us a lot of good. If you are sitting for meditation, start off slow, 5 minutes. Then increase to 10 after a few weeks. Once you get over the initial hump, you will find that you like it and it produces more evenness in your life. As I like to say, meditation is what happens when you sit in those 10 minutes. If you are thinking, or feeling, well that is your meditation. If you feel good, then that is your meditation. Whatever happens, just do it and don’t judge it and get discouraged. It’s time with your self and that is sacred, no matter what happens!

4. Practice detachment. You are a sovereign being. You get to decide what you take in and what you get drawn to. If you feel like you are getting triggered or pulled into negative energies, lovingly withdraw. Thanks, but no thanks. Be very careful of your energy and conserve it. We are not going to save anyone, or change minds. Instead we are trying to listen and heal our relationships by choosing how we want to be.

Here comes the darkness! And with it, an opportunity to start anew. Making friends with the darkness allows its power to infuse us with its grace. We are directed inside. Fear melts. Calm ensues. We rest, as the sun seems to sit still in the darkness. This is a sacred process, the spiritual death of merging with the soil of rebirth. We are blessed by its decay, its absorption of the skin we slough, the pain we leave behind. What’s left is the light of sacred prescience, a newer tougher skin, a revelation of inner power and joy that has been waiting to be noticed. It beckons us forward, into the coming warmth of the Sun.

As we are directed to the inner light to refresh and renew our souls, I want to take a moment of gratitude to you my sweet friends, clients and co-travelers on this journey. Thank you for making me and my work a part of your life. The spirits and ancestors thank you for your courage and strength. I am inspired by each, and every one of you.

As we head into 2017, a wild and unknown territory, I invite you to ready yourselves with a little self-care during this time. If you start to worry about the world, let the darkness take it and hold it in the earth. Turn to the things you love and put energy there. If you need to unplug from the latest tweet, then unplug. The world will be fine without you for a bit. You know, there are things quite bigger than us, than we can handle. This is well and good. We are not meant to take on some things. They are not to tackle alone. Those things are to be held by a movement that will rise up, and we will know when it swells to walk within it. That time is on its way.

What we are meant to do alone, on this eve of the light becoming stronger, is transform the energy of worry, anger and resentment into dreams, art, vision, passion, compassion and care of those who need us. We dearly need each other to accomplish what is before us. Attending to our spiritual foundation, which is the ground we will walk on, takes every day nurturance. Prayers of forgiveness and compassion for those that we fear is our armor. Bridges must be built; alliances are waiting to form. We will know when they beckon us.

If one considers translating these energies into the Tarot, I feel that we have just experienced the Tower card. Big time, right? Things have been shaken up, shocking and clearly disturbing in many ways. Revelations are swirling around us almost too much to take in. So much information and yet as it settles, we are being given the language to understand what is being revealed. It is not always easy to take in, yet it is becoming the story that moves us forward. A story that we all are writing together.

I feel at this time of darkness; we are presently in the Temperance card. The alchemy of change, healing ourselves by connecting to the earth in moments of rest and receptivity. Spending time with nature, meditating and receiving love is what we can do till the energies of the Sun renew the earth, pulling us into the next and more powerful card – Judgement. This is what lies before us. To rise up and to really see. Seeing what is good, what is painful, what needs to be voiced. We are creating the work that needs to be done. What we learned with the Tower card and integrated with the Temperance card is ready not to be called out of us in a new direction. What an amazing time to be alive! To be in touch with our power as alchemists.

So, this is my Solstice wish for all of us, as we step out of the Tower into the place of integration and wholeness, let us not skip this step. Let us all rest in the darkness and be renewed to be called into the next chapter. And may we stand together in united energies as the light shines upon us again, ready to face what is next.